I know that some people are still living with snow, but here in the
Willamette Valley Oregon it’s spring.
65 degrees and blue sky.
And it’s still February.

My commute to work includes being stopped by ramp access lights.
For you folks in less highway-ized parts of the world, in order to spread out cars entering a crowded freeway, there are stop lights that turn green to let single cars onto the freeway.
Cars trying to get into the freeway usually get into two lines and lights on each side alternately turn green letting one car from each lane onto the freeway spread out with 10 or 15 seconds between.

The problem as a driver entering one of these ramps is to choose which of these two lanes to get into. Since the cars are alternating, you want to get into the shortest line. I had developed quick counting skills to count the cars in each of the waiting lanes and decide the one for me.

But, a few weeks ago I realized that I must not be the only one counting. Since it is in everyone’s advantage to always choose the shortest line, I would presume the person ahead of me counted and made the correct decision. All I have to do is choose the opposite of the person just ahead of me.

Well, one week of data gathering and, for the last week, the person ahead of me chose wrong EVERY TIME!!!!
I find this really hard to believe, but there you have it.
Any conclusions are left to the reader.

I spent a few days in Silicon Valley, USA.
The picture to the left is entitled “Sunset over 101″.
For those who don’t know, “Silicon Valley” streatches from San Jose, California to San Francisco and is the starting point for most of the computer companies (from Atari to Google) with the notable exception of Microsoft.
I could tell I was in California because, of the two vending machines near my hotel room, one sold cans of soda for $1.00 while the other sold bottles of water for $1.50.
And I could tell I was in Silicon Valley because the vending machine in the hotel lobby not only sold the usual toothpaste and snacks but it also sold blank CDs and USB flash memory sticks.

The picture on the right is San Jose from the air. Millions of people using billions of watts and making computers so I can blog.

Another feature of the weather we’re having is that one gets to scrap the ice off one’s car each morning.
But it’s not thick ice — it’s delicate ice patterns built from the moisture in the air.
Pretty.

Since California is getting all of the Pacific Northwest’s weather, that leaves us with several weeks of not much happening weather-wise.
Our days have been down to 30 at night but up to 60 during the day.
This is not a typical February.

What this has meant, though, is the first lawn mowing of the year happened this weekend.
The sounds of suburbia are returning early this year.
And the weather continues to be strange everywhere.

Adding another minute to my 15 minutes of fame,
the local metro section of the Oregonian wrote an article about blogging
in this part of town. Check out
Blogging is setting free the inner journalist in people

When the reported contacted me last week, she was looking for mothers who blog –
I guess there was an article about same in the
Wall Street Journal
or something.
But, what she found in this area was me and a few other people who
just blog their lives.
She didn’t want political blogs or news blogs.
She wanted people blogs.
And she found me.

A trip to the pharmacist results in some pills with “Patient Counseling Information”. So, what doesn’t this medication cause?

Not very informative, but, I’m sure, lawyer approved.

This weekend I got my haircut.
I’ve been going to those mall, walk-in hair cut places — Super Cuts, etc –
but this weekend I was frequenting (supporting) local small businesses
and having my shoes re-heeled at the local shoe shop.
And there, two door over, I found a barber shop.

The owner is the third barber there. The two before him clipped hair for
years and eventually retired.
The shop has the bench to sit on, the piles of men’s magazines and the collection
of pictures and memorabilia on the walls that is expected of an
old fashioned barbarshop.
And this was the real thing — none of that obviously chosen and arranged antique
stuff you find in theme shops and restaruants.

There was even the red and white barber poll out front.
And, Izzik Moreno of “The Gentleman’s Edge” gave me a pretty good hair cut.

Support your local shops — the national chains have enough customers.

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As the proud owner of an
Archos Jukebox Recorder 20
(a European company who has been making disk based music players
for longer than most of the American companies),
I have to recommend the
Rockbox
project.
This is an open source replacement for the OS that runs on the
Jukebox. It replaces the OS running there and provides everything from
longer battery life for verbal menu selections.
It is the existance proof of the benefits of an open source project –
benefits to both the company (more features, better support) and
the customers.
I use Rockbox and I send them my donations — it’s worth it.